BMKG will hold Indian Ocean Wave Exercise (IOWAVE16), a two-yearly exercise program of ICG / IOTWMS – Tsunami Early Warning and Mitigation System for the Indian Ocean the Countries. The exercise has been conducted periodically since 2009. The exercise in 2016 is at the same time the contribution of Indonesia to the World Tsunami Awareness Day.
IOWAVE16 exercise is being conducted based on a magnitude 9.2 earthquake scenario in Southwestern Sumatra at 10:00 GMT, September 7, 2016. IOWAVE16 will be held with the involvement of more than 3,000 people from various parts of the community in Padang, Pangandaran, Pacitan and Pandeglang.
In this IOWAVE16, BMKG as a Tsunami Service Provider (TSP) will disseminate tsunami warnings to the National Tsunami Warning Center (NTWC) in 24 Indian Ocean countries, to be forwarded to Disaster Management Offices (DMOs).
At the national level in Indonesia, BMKG in its role as NTWC, will disseminate tsunami warnings to the stakeholders to be forwarded to the public. It aims to validate the information chain of earthquakes and tsunami warnings ranging from dissemination, understanding products and modes of communication, as well as upgrading the district and community preparedness in anticipating tsunami hazards and to test the SOPs through Tabletop Exercise and Tsunami Drill.
The role of Indonesia as one of the Tsunami Service Providers (TSPs), or information provider Tsunami in the Indian Ocean along with Australia and India, will be increasingly important with the move of BMKG to host the Indian Ocean Tsunami Information Centre (IOTIC), which has been established by IOC / UNESCO as Tsunami information center, preparedness, education and capacity building in the Indian Ocean region.
BMKG holds the IOWAVE16 Indonesia jointly by BNPB, with technical assistance from UNESCO Jakarta and strategic communications support from UN ESCAP woth the support of the government of Japan. This exercise will provide valuable inputs to the proposal to enhance the Tsunami Masterplan Indonesia, preparation of the agenda of Indonesia in improving the tsunami risk management system in the Indian Ocean region including those through the Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction in New Delhi, the International Conference on Tsunami Ready by UNESCO, or other regional events of UNESCAP.
